One Day to Relive Forever

This morning Bruce and I went to services at the Unitarian Universalist Church in Brooklyn. The sermon was about "A Day to Live," and a question the minister posed was, if you had to choose one day in your life to relive for all eternity, what day would you choose?

I was reminded of the segment in "Our Town" where the deceased Emily begs for one more day on earth and picks her twelfth birthday because she advised to choose a very ordinary day. Of course she is disappointed and heartbroken as she tries to alert her family that she is really grown up now and has died, and tries to get them to really see her one last time. But to everyone else it is her twelfth birthday, it is business as usual, and no one really sees her.

So in the end she is disappointed because she realizes how we all rush through life with our minds on other things and hardly ever stop to see the person inside, even the people we love the most.

If I had to pick a day to relive forever I don't know that I could do it. Even the most perfect day ever would get incredibly boring after a while. It probably wouldn't even take the first year, and then I'd be stuck with it millennium after millennium, forever? Somehow I don't find that an appetizing thought. I hope the Japanese are wrong and that is not what the afterlife is like at all!

I could probably compile a list of best experiences that I would want to relive, but even so I doubt they would hold up if I had to repeat them eternally. It almost sounds like a variation on "No Exit" to me, except that initially it would be pleasant, even delightful. Maybe if I only had to relive them once a month, or once a year, they would be something to look forward to.

But in the afterlife, I hope there are new things to learn and experience. I hope there are new spirits to meet and possibilities for spiritual growth. I hope there are opportunities to help those still on this side of the veil. What I would like for eternity is the feeling of love, acceptance, and positive challenges that change but offer the chance to make a difference, even when we are no longer equipped with a body. And of course I do believe there is reincarnation and I would like to pick a new lifetime that will be different and exciting to me.

But even the most perfect day, over and over like a broken record? No thanks!